


Cupcakes And Cookies

by decadent_mousse



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Baking, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-13
Updated: 2014-10-13
Packaged: 2018-02-20 23:57:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2447798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/decadent_mousse/pseuds/decadent_mousse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Newt can't sleep, he bakes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cupcakes And Cookies

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sequel to the first Pacific Rim fic I ever wrote, [Newton Geiszler’s House of Pancakes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/961610), though you don't have to have read that one for this one to make sense. I'd actually wanted to get it finished and posted early last month to sort of celebrate writing in the fandom for a year, but better late than never!

Newt rolled over for what had to have been the fifteenth time that night and sighed.  It was no good – no position was comfortable enough, he'd tried tossing off the covers, he'd tried _extra_ covers, he'd even tried wrapping himself around Hermann but all that had gotten him was a sleepy grumble of affection and he still wasn't any closer to falling asleep.  It just wasn't going to happen.

He eased out of bed as quietly as he could and did what he did every other time he couldn't sleep – he headed to the kitchen.  The only question was what to make.  It felt like a baking kind of night.

So… cookies?  Cupcakes?  Either of those would keep him occupied for awhile – he could decorate them with frosting and stuff.  He even briefly – well, okay, not that briefly – entertained the thought of sneaking into the bedroom and frosting _Hermann's face_.  That mental image alone was enough to sell him on Operation: Bake Something.

He chuckled to himself as he flipped on the kitchen light.  Okay, no, that would be evil – _too_ evil – he wasn't going to do that.  ...He _probably_ wasn't going to do that.

Either way, he quickly discovered he didn't have anything to frost cookies, cupcakes, _or_ Hermann with.  He didn't have much of anything he needed, actually.  Hermann's – _their_ , he corrected himself – cupboard was damn near bare.  Did the guy _never_ bake?  That was a difficult concept for Newt to grasp, but it was possible.  Not everyone got up at three in the morning to go on insomnia-fueled baking rampages.

He knew what he had to do.

~

He didn’t realize until he was already more than halfway to the grocery store that he hadn’t changed out of his pajamas, but the employees didn’t say anything about it when he shambled inside with his Godzilla pants and faded, rumpled Green Day t-shirt.  He probably wasn’t the first person to wander in looking like he’d just rolled out of bed.

The lights felt bright – everything felt bright and sharp, but also kind of blurry in that weird way things tended to get when sleep deprivation started to set in.  He’d always had a few sleeping problems, but God, he would have thought he’d be sleeping _easier_ , not worse.  He was having a harder time getting sleep than he had when he’d spent most of his waking hours up to his elbows in kaiju guts with the constant threat of human extinction looming over his head.  Something about that felt really backwards.

Some point about him not knowing what to do with himself or his life now that his area of expertise was kind of obsolete could probably be made, but he didn't really think two am in the baking supply aisle of Super Food Mart was the right time or place to have an existential crisis.

In the end he decided to make cookies _and_ cupcakes, because he had ambitions – delicious baking ambitions.  Oatmeal cookies were an almost instant decision, and he picked up everything he needed for those, but he took awhile longer to decide what sort of cupcakes he should make.  Chocolate sprang to mind, but not that long ago he’d seen a strawberry cupcake recipe that had looked promising, and he knew Hermann couldn’t resist fruity desserts.  

The obvious solution was to make chocolate-strawberry cupcakes.  It wouldn’t be too hard to finesse the recipe a little.  A few minutes after that decision was made, he found himself in the produce section sizing up strawberries.  They weren’t very big, but he was going to chop them up anyway, so he grabbed a couple cartons of them and moved on.

~

About an hour later, Newt was back home with two armfuls of grocery bags.  With a bit of work he managed to open the front door _while_ carrying all of them, and without dropping any, either.  He was so busy quietly gloating to himself about it as he walked into the kitchen and started unloading his loot that he didn't notice that he wasn't alone in the room.

"Do you know what _time_ it is?"

Newt spun around and brandished a box of chocolate cake mix hopefully.  "Cupcake time?"

Hermann glared at him in a way that looked more vaguely disgruntled than genuinely angry.  He was sitting at the kitchen table, hair mussed and a groggy look on his face that told Newt that he must not have been awake for _too_ long.  "Cupcakes."

"And cookies."

Hermann sighed and rubbed his eyes and after a long moment of silence asked, "What kind of cookies?"

Newt grinned.   _Victory_.

~

Newt dipped a finger into the frosting and then slipped it into his mouth.  He hummed thoughtfully.  It tasted pretty good – the strawberries had definitely been the way to go.  It was a bit thin, though.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Hermann staring at him, a blush creeping across his cheeks.  Newt fought the urge to grin.  "I don't know, man, I think it might need more sugar."

"Certainly, because a sugar rush is exactly what we need at four am."

"What, you plan on going back to bed tonight?"

"It is _morning_ , and the thought had crossed my mind, yes."

It had crossed Newt's, too.  He was tired – he'd gotten about an hour of extremely broken sleep which meant he'd probably only gotten around fifteen minutes or so of _actual_ sleep – but he knew in his gut that if he went to bed he'd just end up tossing and turning again.

Hermann's loud sigh broke his train of thought.  He reached over and pulled the spoon out of the bowl of frosting.  Newt watched him lick the spoon and could tell within a couple seconds that the guy had not licked anything off a spoon a day in his life.  Or, if he had, it had been a long time ago, because his lips just barely brushed the surface of the frosting and his tongue quickly darted out and back into his mouth.

“What was _that_?” Newt laughed incredulously.

“What was what?”

“ _That_.  Did any of that actually make it into your mouth?”

Hermann looked offended.  "Yes."

"Was it enough to _taste_ anything?"

"I didn't want to contaminate the frosting," Hermann replied indignantly.

"Oh my God, are you serious?"  

"You're not done using the spoon and–"

"Wow, yeah, man, you're right.  Of course!"  He yanked the spoon away from Hermann and clutched it to his chest in mock horror.  "What was I thinking?  You could have blown the whole operation with your cooties!"

Hermann scowled, and it was too much.  Hermann Gottlieb standing in the middle of the kitchen in his pajamas and a robe in the middle of the night – _okay,_ morning – looking disheveled and grumpy was just too much.  Newt felt a deep swell of affection.

His stomach growled, and Hermann raised an eyebrow.

Okay, affection and _hunger_.  The smell of chocolate and strawberries filled the air, and Newt was only human.  He had needs – cupcake needs.  

"Come on, dude, I need your expertise."

"Really?"  Hermann's face was dubious.

"Really.  And if it really bugs you _that_ much, we can wash the spoon before I stick it back in there, okay?"  He did his best to keep his expression very serious and held out the spoon again.  "Do it, Hermann.  Lick the spoon.  For science."

Hermann rolled his eyes, but reached for the spoon.  Newt expected him to just take it from him, but his fingers wrapped around Newt's and stayed there.  He leaned forward and the tip of the spoon disappeared into his mouth, then the rest of it.  His lips closed around around the narrow base of the spoon, and as he slowly dragged his mouth back upward, he took all of the frosting with it.  He stood back and licked his lips, looking casual and innocent like he hadn't just licked and sucked on a spoon in a way usually reserved for things way more pornographic than baking.

God.   _Jesus._  Holy shit.

Newt’s heart thudded hard in his chest.  He laid the mostly naked – _wow, bad choice of words_ – spoon on the edge of the sink and took a couple steps forward.  “So,” he said, and had to clear his throat and try again because _wow_.  “So, what do you think?”

“It… _could_ use more sugar.”

“Now–” Newt did a double-take.  “Really?”

“Yes, really.”

“Who are you and what have you done with my boyfriend?  You know, grumpy guy, likes math, hates processed sugar and fun–"

Hermann grabbed him by the front of his shirt and kissed him.  He tasted like the frosting, which was nice – not that Newt ever really needed extra incentive, but it didn’t hurt.  Hermann made a soft, pleased noise and leaned into the kiss, gently cupping Newt's face with one hand.  Newt slid his arms into Hermann's robe and wrapped them loosely around his waist.  

Once they broke off the kiss, Newt laid his head on Hermann's chest and felt Hermann lightly kiss the top of his head then rest his chin there, and he could have stayed like that for the rest of the not-quite-morning if he didn't have cupcakes to bake.

"Mmm, definitely needs more sugar," he mumbled into Hermann's chest, something verging on _sleepy_ finally tickling the back of his brain.

" _You_ definitely need sleep."

"Cupcakes first, then sleep.  Maybe.  Besides, you still need to taste-test the cupcake batter."

He figured he probably wasn’t going to get around to making the cookies, but it was just as well.  He wasn't sure if he could have handled watching Hermann eat cookie dough.  Not after watching him sample the frosting.  

A guy could only handle so much.


End file.
